What was Louis Napoleon Bonaparte's nationalist response to rising to power?

Louis Napoleon Bonaparte, otherwise known as Napoleon III, was a fascinating figure. Jailed as a result of a failed coup attempt in the 1830s, Louis Napoleon escaped from prison in the 1840s and found his way into France's National Assembly in the chaos of the Revolution of 1848. Over the next couple of years he coalesced his power and became President of the Second Republic. Ever ambitious, he manufactured a coup d'état in 1851, which led to the formation of the Second Empire. This political maneuvering is famously documented by Marx in his essay The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Napoleon (1852).
Napoleon III was a champion of nationalism. In addition to increasing national pride in France itself through his famous public works projects in the 1850s and 60s overseen by Baron Haussmann, he also sponsored nationalist objectives in other contexts. He supported Italian nationalism in the 1860s. Increasing the scale of France's international involvement, he doubled the size of its overseas empire.
Finally, his attempt to champion French national pride got him involved in the Franco-Prussian War in 1870, which led to major military defeats and the end of his Empire. He went into exile and died a couple of years later.